Telecommunication providers (Telcos) have made significant investments in fiber infrastructure in order to deliver fiber-based services to their customers. The migration to fiber gives Telcos an advantage over copper-based DSL because of the signal is not as vulnerable to near and far end cross talk interface, and line length proportional attenuation. Also, much higher data rates may be achieved than over copper. This is also an advantage over cable providers who have moved into the telecommunication space and are now providing phone and high speed internet services over cable. Optical fiber promises to deliver phone, television and data services at rates simply not possible with cable.
A major limiting factor in providing fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) services is implementation cost. In addition to burying fiber lines or stringing them on poles, there is a relatively high cost in delivering fiber the last 10, 20, 40 or 100 feet to the customer's premises, whether that is a business or residence. Multiple dwelling units (MDUs) are more cost effective than widely distributed neighborhoods to implement optical-based services because of the close proximity of units. In MDU implementations, one or more fiber lines are usually split at a box at the MDU with individual fiber lines terminating at a termination unit at each customer's unit. Despite the high density of potential customers, the equipment costs are significant. Thus, it would be desirable to provide optical network service to subscribers in an MDU that reduces the implementation cost to the Telco.